Dean Richards seeks redemption after Bloodgate as the big-time beckons with Newcastle

On a purely physical level, Dean Richards would always struggle to maintain a
low profile, but the former England colossus has done a pretty good job of
keeping himself off the rugby radar for the past 12 months.

Yet all that is likely to change over the next few weeks as Richards and the Newcastle Falcons side he leads go through what many believe will be the formality of securing promotion back into the Aviva Premiership.

There are no guarantees, of course, but as the Falcons have won all 21 of their RFU Championship matches to date you would hesitate to bet against them stretching that run to 22 against Bristol at Kingston Park on Saturday afternoon.

After which, the north-east side will still have to negotiate home-and-away semi-final and final play-offs to clinch their return to the top flight, but they are overwhelming favourites to do so.

Astonishingly, the Bristol game marks the first anniversary of their last defeat in a competitive game – a 3-9 loss against Saracens at Kingston Park – a record that means Richards, who officially took over last August, has yet to see his team lose a match of any significance.

So the big-time beckons again. Which means, for Richards, a return to the spotlight after the gory sequence of events that began with Harlequins wing Tom Williams biting into a fake blood capsule and ended with Richards being banned for three years for orchestrating one of the most notorious scandals in rugby history. Bloodgate. A suitable name for the sport’s most venal episode.

Harlequins restored their reputation quickly, but Richards’s name stayed in the dirt while he served his time. And yet, as his sentence neared its end, the offers came in as potential employers began to remember what he had achieved in the game.

Understandably, Richards would prefer to talk about what his Falcons team has achieved rather than his own past, but he has been around long enough to know the questions remain. He knows he has ground to make up yet before he acquires the status of prodigal son, but did he ever fear that rugby would turn its back on him?

“I didn’t really think about it that way,” he says carefully. “But yes, I was surprised when I did get approaches. I was surprised that people were showing some interest again and that their interest was sincere. There were genuine offers in front of me.

“Thankfully for me, Newcastle ticked all the boxes. There were other clubs that showed an interest that I could have gone to, and having looked at how they have fared over the past 12 months, I’m quite pleased I didn’t pursue those.”

There are those who thought Richards got off lightly in 2009, that his ban should have been for life. He has served his time, but his name is forever bloodstained.

He says he has had a good reception wherever he has gone over the past 12 months, but it is hard to imagine he will get through a season in the Premiership without hearing a few taunts.

So it is maybe just as well that those three years gave him time to reflect. Has he come back wiser? “I hope so,” Richards says with a shrug. “They say there’s no fool like an old fool, but I think I’m a little bit more mellow than I was before.”

If his time at Newcastle has gone some way towards rebuilding Richards’s reputation, it has had a restorative effect on the club as well. In truth, the Falcons had been dodging relegation bullets almost every year since Sir John Hall’s millions swept them to Premiership triumph in 1998, so the drop was long overdue. But Newcastle survived a mini-exodus of players, recruited cleverly and have been untouchable ever since.

Richards’s departure from Harlequins is part of rugby folklore, but his reconstruction of the Stoop’s perennial underachievers after their relegation in 2005 ought to be acknowledged as well.

The parallels with Newcastle are obvious, and Richards believes that he can create something similar at Kingston Park. The building for potential Premiership rugby is under way, with the announcement on Thursday of the signing of Saracens and England Saxons flanker Andy Saull on top of their acquisition of Rory Clegg, who returns to the club from Quins.

“I think people tend to forget that there is a huge rugby pedigree up here and the passion for rugby is fantastic,” says Richards.

“When you look at Harlequins and compare their relative spends to sides like Leicester and Saracens and Northampton, the beauty is that they have done it on a limited budget, well within the salary cap. I think it is possible to do that providing you have the right structures in place, you get the right coach and you get the right players together.

“Sometimes those things don’t all happen at the same time and it can take a year or two to get there. But it is quite feasible to get up that ladder, get to the top and stay there.”

Top four clubs go into a play-off for promotion

Newcastle

Relegated last season and unbeaten in the Championship since Dean Richards took over as their director of rugby last summer. Their Kingston Park ground meets Premiership standards.Do they meet the criteria? Yes

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Nottingham

Last featured in the top flight in 1992. Ground share with Notts County but primacy of tenure no longer a stumbling block after London Welsh won a legal challenge.Do they meet the criteria? Yes

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Bedford

A Premiership club until 2000 and now a model Championship side, but Goldington Road, with a capacity of 6,000, is not big enough under Premiership rules.Do they meet the criteria? No

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Leeds

Have had three spells in the Premiership. Share Headingley with the city’s rugby league club and are now coached by Diccon Edwards. Do they meet the criteria? Yes

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Bristol

Have already had four spells in the Premiership, the most recent in 2009. Share the Memorial Stadium with Bristol Rovers Football Club but have plans to share with rivals Bristol City. Do they meet the criteria? Yes